An Ode to Judd's Marfa Boxes

The morning light coats my comforter like honey to a comb. Outside, Marfa: an epicenter for art-obsessed vagabonds. The West warps one’s vision like a funhouse mirror. The flora stoops low, the mountains stack like crumbly shortbread, the sky is fantastically big and full of clouds, elastic webs of spun sugar.

Donald Judd undoubtedly had this beauty in mind when mapping his industrial landscape. As I approach the trail seasoned with banality, the boxes nag at me like characters on television. Three facing open to each other share a secret, one which only the most curious viewers may discover. Faced the other direction, they are like coworkers at odds. Unifying them is the view they each frame: plant, road, and sky— an artfully constructed cake. The boxes, basic and inviting, are playgrounds for the imagination.

Following the path back to the parking lot, I turned around to capture a final mental shot. The boxes had transformed. It was hard to tell which walls faced where. A cubical illusion characterized by the spilling beams. They must look new, I thought, with every stride the sun takes.